The Trail of Tears

The audiovisual performance The Trail of Tears is based on a real historical event. In 1830, the U.S. government ordered the five remaining Native American tribes living east of the Mississippi River, known as the civilized tribes,  to take all their belongings and relocate from their ancestral lands. The forced journey of the Indians towards the mainland in winter, which passed down in history as “the trail of tears”, carried within it many dangers. Many Indians lost their lives on the way to their new homeland. The Trail of Tears is one of the last chapters of the extensive European advance in America, resulting in the demise of the native populations’ civilizations. The performance will use excerpts from Erich Scheurmann’s book The Papalagi, original texts, and evidence from historical sources.

*Featured in the performance will be Iannis Xenakis’ piece Rebonds B for solo percussion, Lefteris Papadimitriou’s musical composition Variations for Piano, and Vasilis Kountouris’ (Studio 19) sound composition Beats & Pieces.

*We would like to thank Proti Yli Publications for kindly providing the excerpts from the book “The Papalagi” by Erich Scheurmann.